Kameron Warlitner
6/18/19
HR: Artifacts, Notes

Final Reflective Essay

First off, let me go ahead and say that I am incredibly thankful for having the opportunity to take this class. It has allowed me to explore my own thoughts and opinions as well as affirm previous opinions that I have had in the past. This course has both allowed me to grow and learn as a person while at the same time allowing me to justify why I have had specific thoughts in the past which we will explore shortly

Sex and Gender

First off, I have always thought that sex and gender were the same things. Being interchangeable and meaning the same thing referring to what an individual is based on the external genitalia that they were born with. However, while I was a little bit anxious to say that gender is different from sex, I began to rethink my decision after being exposed to how much society banks off gender norms in order to identify male and female as well as those who may be born with ambiguous genitalia. For example, I bring up in Artifact 1 that I have witnessed gender stereotypes with my previous job using the example of a man being shamed for working for his wife.
As I continued, I went a little more in depth into the idea of transgender and third gender individuals and what other cultures had to say about it and was quite surprised. For example, what shocked me the most was the fact that Native Americans had what they called “Two Spirits” which can be considered third gender. The more I began to think about it, I began realizing that those individuals simply weren’t looking for attention nor were they trying to affect other people’s lives, they simply wanted to attempt to find themselves just like the rest of us.

The Gender Health Gap

I further found my eyes being opened when we began discussing the gender health gap and the issues that society has when attempting to treat both men and women. I was always under the impression that society had always had an issue with addressing men’s mental health, but I had not understood that women were also facing. I discussed how each gender faced more risks with being diagnosed with specific illnesses such as women being more likely to be diagnosed with mood disorders while men are more likely to have their depression symptoms overlooked. As I further researched points for Artifact 2, I noticed that inequalities extended farther than the mental health of both genders. Although I am still a little iffy on the gender pay gap, it is pertinent to recognize that maternal leave in the United States is nonexistent. Yes, the employer is obligated to reserve the women’s job for when she eventually returns, but many simply fire the women prior to giving birth in order to get out of this obligation. How can we expect women to take care of children when they have no support? How can we expect men to feel more emotions when they are oftentimes ignored? These were just a few of the many questions that came to mind upon learning of this topic.

Female Circumcision

As stated in the artifact concerning female circumcision, I previously had no idea that it even existed in the first place. It was astonishing to me that something such as cutting off a clitoris, removing the labia minora, and sowing the labia majora shut even existed on this planet. However, I find myself at an impasse. I sternly believe that we should respect the cultures of others because I would prefer that other cultures don’t attempt to judge mine. However, I found myself questioning the reasoning behind a culture practicing such a dangerous tradition, and this involves male circumcision as well. I remember a specific documentary following an African tribe’s tradition of circumcising a young man and leaving him out in a hut, restricting him from drinking water and eating, until it was fully healed. As I said before, I believe that we should respect other cultures, however I find myself wanting to change such a dangerous practice. Especially when proper medicine is not being used. I have yet to quite figure out how to deal with this concept, but I am still contemplating it.

Female Menstruation

Now this is one of those moments when my previous beliefs were confirmed. In my house, we have never had an issue with menstruation. We have all accepted it as a natural thing and refuse to acknowledge it as an excuse to be moody. On the other hand, we don’t judge it either. If it happens, then you simply help where you can (buying tampons, pads, etc.) and you just go about your regular day. However, I found that, apparently, the rest of society and the world doesn’t quite agree with us. From being embarrassed to have it all the way to being temporarily exiled for having it, it seems that female menstruation isn’t fully accepted just yet. As I discussed in Artifact 6, I believe that education is the most important step in getting rid of this idiotic stigma. If parents and public education institutions educate the children on the reasons behind menstruation and set the example that it isn’t something to be made fun of or ashamed of, then we may be able to look forward to a future generation that accepts it, ending the negative stigmas and stereotypes.

Closing

Once again, I am very happy with having the opportunity to take this class. It has opened my eyes to issues that I had previously been ignorant of and taught me to be more accepting of individuals and ideas that I may not be familiar with or may not fully understand just yet. Talking specifically about transgender men and women, I had always found myself talking about them as though they weren’t people just like you and me. It also affirmed that we don’t live in a society that specifically demonizes one sex over the other. Both men and women face issues with expectations and practices in our society, and it simply isn’t a contest to see who suffers more. We need to back up a little and understand that we all have expectations, stereotypes, and do things that will be frowned upon by someone. The important thing is to realize that it is as simple as respecting other cultures, people, and practices regardless of whether you may agree to it or not. Because there may be reasons behind the actions and ideas that we don’t quite understand yet, but I hope that we can come to some sort of understanding soon. Our society needs it.

References:

Artifact 1: https://sites.vmi.edu/warlitnerkh20/2019/05/22/artifact-1-sex-and-gender-crocodiles-cannot-physically-stick-their-tongues-out/

Artifact 4: https://sites.vmi.edu/warlitnerkh20/2019/05/30/artifact-4-gender-health-gap/

Female Circumcision: What’s This All About? https://sites.vmi.edu/warlitnerkh20/2019/06/09/female-circumcision-whats-this-all-about/

Artifact 6: https://sites.vmi.edu/warlitnerkh20/2019/06/12/artifact-6-what-do-you-think-about-menstruation/

Who is Robert Eads?

Robert Eads is an transgender man that lives in the United States. Originally being advised NOT to go through with the gender reassignment surgery, Robert was diagnosed with cervical cancer in 1996. In his life prior to transitioning, he was married to a man at one point and birthed two children. However, he would later say that pregnancy made him feel as though he is more trapped inside of a female body, and would later begin transitioning in his forties.

Southern Comfort

The film Southern Comfort follows Robert’s journey to a conference held in Georgia for those who are also transgender know as “SOCO” or the Southern Comfort Conference. Also, it shows the effects of cervical cancer as well as how the treatment affects the patients. Simultaneously, the film explores the relationships that Robert has with his fellow transgender friends and lover, Lola. This is what he calls his “chosen family”, and the film goes through each of their lives and sheds light on the day to day life of a transgender man or woman as well as their stories of transitioning. I believe that the underlying tone of the film is to show that transgender individuals are humans just like us, and truly does shed light on the idea that they simply want to live their lives as normally as possible regardless of whether they may be different from the norm.

Family Support

The film sheds plenty of light on the idea of family. I myself have learned first hand that social support is an important part of human development with family support being extremely important. We learn early on that Robert’s biological parents weren’t too keen on him transitioning, even going as far as to say that they wished he would have just remained gay instead. However, while this film does delve into the negative reality of not being accepted, it shows that this can all be turned around into something rather beautiful. As mentioned before, Robert has what it called a “chosen family” which consists of his fellow transgender friends and their lovers. Throughout the film you can both see and feel the strong bond between everyone. Their willingness to help each other out in emotionally difficult situations, the joy you see on their faces as they joke around with each other, and the pain felt as Robert eventually succumbs to his illness. All of these factor into the idea that while family has traditionally been biological, it isn’t required to be that way. Robert was not related to a single individual in his group, yet the love and respect they had for one another seemed to be more visible than what I’ve seen in biological families in my lifetime.

Personally, my family is truly the only thing that I have. So if I were ever to lose them for any reason it would certainly crush me as a person. However, I believe that it would be worse if I were to be rejected by them. There’s something just a little bit more painful about the thought of your family making the choice to no longer interact with you as opposed to them passing away. Thankfully, I don’t believe that there’s anything I could do that would cause my entire family to reject me, especially my immediate family. However, the thought still scares me to death and I would never want to risk it.

Stereotypes

From what I’ve seen, the main stereotypes that surround transgender individuals consist of assumptions that these people just want attention, they want to control individuals by dictating what pronouns other people use, and how they’re individuals who are extremely sick in some way. While how them feeling as though their gender does not align with the biological parts that they were born with may be confusing to non-transgender individuals, Southern Comfort shows that this simply isn’t the case. Most transgender individuals just want to be accepted and live their lives as normally as possible. It appears that that’s not where the stereotypes end, however. It appears that when transgender individuals are represented in television shows, it appears that most of the time their character’s profession is overwhelmingly involved with being a sex worker. Basically only being a fetish tool for heterosexual individuals and nothing more. Furthermore, there is a myth surrounding the transgender community that every transgender individual has to have the surgery in order to be considered transgender. This can not be further from the truth. It is solely based on the opinion of the individual, and as we have seen with the example of Lady Boys in Thailand, one doesn’t necessarily have to have gender reassignment surgery in order to feel whole.

Cited:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Eads

https://sccfla.org/

https://www.glaad.org/publications/victims-or-villains-examining-ten-years-transgender-images-television

https://www.vox.com/identities/2016/5/13/17938088/transgender-people-rights-myths

Women’s Opinion on Menstruation

Women in the U.S., while not going through some of the hardships that some women around the world face, still seem to have quite a bit to deal with when talking about menstruation. Normally, the topic of menstruation is usually a topic that is kept “hush hush” within the American household, and it appears that even most women have adopted this “don’t ask, don’t tell” attitude. Why is this? When asking my sisters and mother why they may have negative views towards menstruation, I was met with responses that centered around their symptoms. Cramps, bloating, and bleeding were the reasons for them having a negative view on their period, but there didn’t seem to be any sort of embarrassment involved with it. However, this opinion is not shared with most other women within the U.S.

Why the Stigma?

In my personal opinion, the reason for menstruation being such a taboo topic may stem from multiple things. One, maybe it’s even the slight mention of blood that causes people to be squeamish and not want to talk about some things. Two, and the reason I think is the most probable, there isn’t a lot of general knowledge behind why menstruation occurs and what happens during it. This lack of knowledge trickles down to the very beginning when teenage girls experience it for the first time. a young girl experiences her period. At first, she isn’t aware of what’s going on and is terrified. Then, when surrounded by young boys who also don’t understand it at all, she decides to hide it in order to not cause a disturbance or disgust someone. Fast forward later on when the girl is now a woman and has a better understanding of what her menstrual cycle consists of, yet her male partner does not. This ignorance causes a misunderstanding and a lack of empathy for something that is generally out of the woman’s control due to it being natural.

All in all, this negative attitude towards menstruation eventually causes both girls and women to feel as though they need to hide the fact that they’re on their period, and may cause them to believe that them having their period is a burden to themselves and to others. As anyone may understand, it isn’t easy to believe that you have to “deal with something” that occurs naturally every month.

How Can We Fix It?

Education. Education. Education. The key to destroying a negative stigma is to educate young individuals so that they may grow up with knowledge about it so that they may not fear it. For women, tell young girls exactly what goes on and why it happens, and inform them that it isn’t something to get ashamed about due to it being a natural occurrence. On the flip side, inform boys that, while they may not go through it, understand that it is an important part of being a woman, and while they may not enjoy the idea of blood coming out of a vagina, they should be respectful of the natural process and attempt to look at it in a less negative light.

Types of Female Circumcision

Prior to this class, I was under the impression that there was only male circumcision. The idea that there was such a thing as female circumcision was previously unheard of, and I had never quite given any thought to the idea that women could also undergo circumcision because I hadn’t thought that there was any need to do so in the first place. Not only was the idea of female circumcision shocking to me, but the fact that there are multiple forms of it. There are four primary types of female circumcision: type I, type II, type III, and type IV. Type I consists of “dehooding” the clitoris or simply taking part of it off entirely. Type II pertains to the complete removal of the clitoris as well as the partial removal or the labia minora (or the “inner lips”). Type III is possibly the most drastic and disturbing of the all of the circumcisions, involving the removal of the clitoris and labia minora as well as sowing up the remaining labia majora in order to completely sow the female genitalia together. Type IV is more of a categorical things, consisting of any other piercing or modification not previously mentioned.

Why Female Circumcision?

Although female circumcision is predominantly practiced in the middle east and Islamic countries, it is not just an Islamic practice. Female circumcision can be found in other regions, such as portions of Africa, for multiple reasons. For some cultures it is a sign of womanhood and is seen as a right of passage. However, other areas of the world use it as another way to control females. It can be used as a way to keep women from sexual exploration by either removing the clitoris or sowing the vaginal area shut in order to avoid any type of sexual intercourse what so ever. These practices, as to be expected, come with their own risks and consequences. Infection is an ever-present danger in countries who do not have access to modern medicine. Procedures are oftentimes taken up by midwives and are rarely ever performed with practiced medical professionals and state of the are tools. Along with infections, other complications are also something to be concerned about. For some, type III circumcisions have a risk that involves blocking the vaginal opening, impeding menstruation from occurring. With nowhere to go, the buildup of material causes swelling and further complications, such as infection, that may result in symptoms ranging from discomfort all the way to death.

Why is This Still Prevalent?

Due to female circumcision being a cultural and religious practice, it is unclear if and when it will ever cease to exist. With the idea that it increases cleanliness and furthering a woman’s commitment, it has been difficult to change the public’s knowledge about the practice, yet strides have been made. Public education on the dangers of female circumcision have been exposed to the public, and western doctors have begun to perform ceremonial pinpricks in order to deter families from sending their daughters to get the entire procedure carried out. Also, the education of immigrant women on the practice of circumcision has been an ongoing process, showing women from other cultures that the practice is not something that is done around the world and that they do not have to live in fear of it occurring to them.

Citing:

https://vmi.instructure.com/courses/10495/files/371688/download?wrap=1

Early Exposure

We are all aware of how malleable young children are, and when I say children I am referring to those younger than thirteen years of age. In the past, kids and adolescence would be exposed to sex either by accident or by being exposed progressively through parental or peer guidance. However, with the emergence of smart phones and the easily accessed internet, we are finding that children are being exposed to pornographic material at an average age of 11.5 years old. This is incredibly important to remember, because some of these children may have not even gone through puberty yet. Also, at this confusing time in their lives they are easily influenced which will come up again later when talking about how what they see in porn may have a negative effect on how they view themselves and others.

Image and Expectations

So let’s get right into the nitty gritty of it. Starting off with the message of image that porn sends, it seems that it oftentimes sends a message of perfection in the male or female body regardless of how you achieve it. For example, you see plenty of women with large breasts, plush lips, shaved genitals, and copious amounts of makeup. While on the male side we often see rather physically stout men with exceptionally large penises. In regards to women, porn sends the message that if you don’t look like them they you simply won’t be deemed as attractive to men. Although a lot of the females in the porn industry have had some sort of plastic surgery, young girls are unaware of this and simply assume that if they are not built the same way as the pornstars then they are inadequate. The same applies for men, if young boys see a man with a large penis and do not have one anywhere close to the same size, they will feel as though they are not as much of a man and are therefore inadequate.

Moving on to expectations, they can also have a significant impact on how both young girls and boys see their roles and the roles of their partner during sex. More and more we see a category of pornography known as “gonzo porn” in which the female is degraded in more ways than one. Slapping, choking, extreme bondage, and name calling are just a few of the extreme lengths that gonzo porn is known to go to. What kind of message does this send to young kids watching porn for the first time? For girls, it shows how they are expected to be submissive to men and be treated in whatever way that the man deems in order for him to experience the max amount of pleasure. Not only are women expected to act in this way, they are also expected to enjoy it. On the flip side, boys are shown that women are to be treated as objects and “toys” for their own personal pleasure, completely disregarding them as people and rather as instruments of pleasure that can be used and discarded at will.

Relationships

Given the expectations provided to young individuals by porn, one can understand how this may be detrimental to how both young men and women go about forming relationships. With the idea that women are objects, young boys have a hard time connecting emotionally with females, either leading to mistreatment or loneliness. Young girls, tragically, come to conclusion that if they are mistreated or not shown emotional attention it is either because it’s to be expected because “that’s just the way it is” or they believe they have to provide sex in order to get some sort of emotional response.

Citing:

https://vmi.instructure.com/courses/10495/files/411764/download?wrap=1

https://vmi.instructure.com/courses/10495/files/371719/download?wrap=1

Differences in Health Between Men and Women

Obviously there are biological differences between men and women, however this extends far beyond just the fun parts. There is a wide range of medical issues that effects one sex more than the other, oftentimes causing medical officials to take the individual’s sex into consideration when giving diagnoses. For example, women are more likely to be affected by iron deficiencies, fibromyalgia, and Alzheimer’s, while men have a higher risk for substance abuse, asthma as young boys, and Parkinson’s. Also, new research suggests that women have a tendency to experience the symptoms of a heart attack differently from men as well as new research pointing to the possibility of different dosages being required depending if the patient is male or female. All of these differences come from the different compositions of hormones and behaviors found in males and females. For example, men are more likely to spend extended periods of time out in the sun, leading them to have higher rates of skin cancers.

Gender Norms and Behaviors involving Health

Believe it or not, gender norms have a significant effect on how individuals go about reporting possible injuries as well as how doctors may decide to treat them. For example, women are more likely to be diagnosed with mood and anxiety disorders, although they may not fit the entire criteria of the diagnosis. This could possibly be due to the traditional belief that women tend to be more emotional and less in control of them, leading to a certain bias towards women and emotional disorders. Just as women are more likely to be diagnosed with mood and anxiety disorders, men are less likely to have their depression symptoms overlooked due to idea that men should not focus on their own emotions and “be a man.”

Masculinity and Power Inequalities

Overall, men have a tendency to have more injuries (whether intentional or unintentional). One would think that this would lead to an equal amount of hospital visits from men, correct? Wrong. Masculinity may have its perks when giving men something to aspire to and stand for, however, it oftentimes leads to men not wanting to go in to get check ups, get medicine, or take care of injuries due to the idea that they should be tough and “take it on the chin like a man.” Also, just like women with pregnancy, men often can’t afford to take time off of work to nurse an injury, leading to easily treatable injuries turning into more complicated issues due to the idea that men should just tough it out.

The traditional gender roles that women face also have a significant effect on them. Just like men, the expectations and general beliefs centered around women can have negative effects on mental health. For example, the idea that women should remain at home and take care of the children could lead to the idea that she is simply just a housewife and nothing more. The feeling of depression and worthlessness, however, is not exclusive to the home. Society’s standard for female beauty often leads to women feeling as though they aren’t as beautiful as they could be. Personally, I see this all the time. I see young women my age attempting to buy expensive clothes, makeup, and in some cases cosmetic surgery in order to become more beautiful. Most of the time this isn’t because of their own personal belief, but because of what society deems as beautiful, in which they fall in line with. Another thing that I have noticed is the confidence, or lack their of, when it comes to young females. Now, I am not sayin this as a personal attack towards anyone, I am simply stating what I have seen. It’s understandable that when you have a society that demands so much from you and you can’t deliver, it doesn’t quite fill you with the confidence that you should have. I hear young women say that they are self conscious about things that I myself don’t even look at. For example eyebrows, baby hairs, heights, eye size, and the sound of one’s voice are just a few of the many things that I have young women complain about for no other reason than comparing themselves to celebrity women and deeming themselves inferior.

References: https://vmi.instructure.com/courses/10495/files/411511/download?wrap=1

Global Gender Gap

The Global Gender Gap refers to general inequality between men and women on multiple issues. These issue include but are not limited to the access to work, child care, education, and health care, as well as reproductive control, choice of marriage, violence and discrimination, and equal representation in politics. These issues can be both nation-based and worldwide, with some nations exercising higher restrictions on a specific gender. Specifically, a study performed found that out of 4,830 Middle Eastern men, 31% in Lebanon and 64% in Egypt had admitted to sexually harassing women in some way. These cases of harassment can range from verbal cat calling all the way to unwelcome physical touching and rape.

Rankings of Countries on the Global Gender Gap

When it comes to how countries are ranked on the Global Gender Gap, the factors that are examined are economic participation/opportunity, educational attainment, health and survival, and political empowerment. The nations that currently stand at the top of the list are Iceland, Norway, and Sweden, with Iraq, Pakistan, and Yemen taking up the bottom. Taking a look at the differences between top and bottom, the greatest difference is economic participation and opportunity. For example, Iceland’s (#1) score in this category is 0.806 and Yemen’s (#149) score in this category 0.352. We also see that political empowerment plays a major role with the lowest ranking nations’ scores varying from 0.13 to 0.03 and the highest rankings nation’s scores ranging from 0.5 to 0.7.

The United States currently stands at #57 in the Global Gender Gap Index. What differentiates the U.S. is its level in political empowerment (ranked 73) and economic participation and opportunity (ranked 26). Surprisingly, health and survival (ranked 63) is also what pulls the U.S. down in the rankings. It appears that the nations in the top ten of the list are significantly higher in the three previously stated categories. If the United States has any hope of improving its ranking, significant improvements need to be made in the political empowerment categories. Having equal representation in the Senate and House of Representatives could increase the United States’ ranking in political empowerment.

Pregnancy and the Gender Gap

One of the most common traditional gender roles in society is the idea that women are supposed to be the caregivers of children within the household. The expectation to have and raise children is deeply routed in many nations, and oftentimes hinders a woman’s ability to work. It is expected that, upon having children, women should remain at home and care for the child as well as recover from the pregnancy. However, the only assistance that women have when in the U.S. is known as the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) which will protect the woman’s job after 12 weeks after childbirth or adoption. Most maternity leave in the U.S. is unpaid, and is based on company policy. The lack of any federal regulation often leaves women unpaid during leave, with and expectation to maintain the household, take care of the child, and take care of themselves simultaneously. The role of men in regards to domestic responsibilities remains as it always has: bringing in money into the house. Men are expected to bring in money to the household, but are not expected to take care of much on the home front. Although roles are changing nowadays, the traditional idea is that the men bring home the bacon while women play a more supportive role at the house.

Factors for Inequality in Pakistan

While it is all based on perspective, gender inequality has oftentimes been a rather prominent issue when talking about the Middle East. However, what factors play a role on making such a large gender inequality? Most of it is based on the norms of their society. At every stage of life, women in Pakistan face restrictions based on a very strict set of rules within their society. Beginning at birth, sons are favored far more than daughters due to the idea that women cannot make decisions for themselves and cannot be left alone. From there, the restrictions range from not being permitted to be anywhere without the presence of a male, dressing in traditional clothing that covers them from head to toe, being completely submissive to their husbands, being married off at extremely young ages, and, possibly worst of all, being killed if they break traditional norms in order to preserve the honor of the family.

References:

Gender inequality in Pakistan  

• http://reports.weforum.org/global-gender-gap-report-2016/economies/#economy=USA
• https://vmi.instructure.com/courses/10495/files/411508/download?wrap=1
• https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2017/06/15/532977361/why-do-men-harass-women-new-study-sheds-light-on-motivations
• https://www.thecut.com/article/maternity-leave-usa.html

Each individual nation throughout history has had their own relationship between gender and culture. However, how do they come to this relationship? What factors cause certain societies to value sons over daughters and vice versa? In order to possibly explain this, we will take a quick look at how the economy, political organization, globalization, and development have affected the nation of the Incans and their relationship between gender and their culture. We will also take a look at how gender roles have changed in the United States over time, as well as compare patrilineal cultures to the Mosuo people of China’s matrilineal culture.

Much of the measurement of wealth within the Incan society was centered around land ownership and access to resources, and we see early on that the importance of gender is prominent. To begin with, land was usually portioned out to the male head of the household, with each additional birth of a son awarding the head of the household additional land and a female awarding him half that amount. When a son was married, he would have land relinquished to him on the father’s behalf. On the other hand, while most women had to give up the land given to their father upon their birth, there have been reports of women sometimes being able to keep their share of the land given to their father. These decisions were made and controlled by local kinship groups known as ayllus, who were responsible for the distribution of goods throughout the community.

We can also see a difference in the distribution of work depending on gender. Men were expected to maintain public work projects, serve in the military, become runners for a postal service, farming, herding, etc., while women were expected to weave cotton and wool cloth for garments and trade as well as farm, herd, prepare food, and care for children. While there are clear gender roles within the Inca household, if men or women were unable to perform their regular duties due to performing a duty for the community it was common practice to recruit others in order to fulfill household duties without any social issue.

Although regular Inca life relied on interdependence between men and women, administrative power in politics was strictly for males. with the highest position of emperor being reserved for males only. The queen, or coya, would often be the emperor’s sister and would often be responsible for special land that would be used as testing grounds for new strains of crops. Also, temporarily, she would wield political power in the absence of the emperor. Although the coya was not the only wife of the emperor, she was the “top dog” in regards to the ranks of the wives, with the children of other wives becoming political and economic leaders within the community.

Although the nation of the Incas had remained undisturbed by the outside world, the arrival of the Spaniards would wedge a gap between the cultural idea of an Inca household. While Inca women were permitted to own property prior to the arrival of the Spanish, Spanish law would prohibit these privileges. Furthermore, women were restricted from schooling as well as access to traditional weaving guilds, and were therefore forced to be hired at extremely low wages for the same amount of work. Other offences included rape, forced prostitution, and witch-hunts. While men were used mainly as manual labor tool in order to further the production of crops and trade goods for the Spaniards, the arrival of the Spanish dealt a significant blow to the roles and rights to the Inca women.

While we have examined the Incan society, we will now shortly examine how the roles of men and women have changed over time in the United States. The main way that gender roles have changed in the U.S. is the roles within the household. While men were expected to be the bread winners of the household and women were expected to take care of everything at home, we now see that there is more and more a division of labor within the households. Both men and women are now bringing in revenue, and women are no longer the only ones expected to take care of housework. This can be seen as far back as WWII, when women took over the jobs left behind by the men going off to war. Also, within the workforce, women are not excluded from certain fields as they were in the past. Women are slowly, but surely, inching their way into STEM fields, furthering the equal representation of both men and women within the community.

Most cultures throughout history have been seen as patriarchal, or basically, mainly run and controlled by men. However, there is a society in which this role is completely reversed: the Mosuo of China. The main difference is that the roles seem to be completely switched. While in traditional patrilineal cultures the men have the power, we see that in Mosuo the women are in charge. The eldest woman has the final say of what goes on in the family, women are the only ones permitted to live in the elevated areas of the household, and, possibly the most surprising, men are not deemed as important. Rather, men are not required in the household, especially during courtship. Women also perform most of the labor work, such as farming, and also have the freedom to choose to be with as many male partners as they desire (which is typically seen in reverse in patrilineal cultures.

References: file:///C:/Users/kamer/AppData/Local/Packages/Microsoft.MicrosoftEdge_8wekyb3d8bbwe/TempState/Downloads/Agricultural%20states%20(1).pdf

Especially nowadays, there has been much debate on whether or not there is a difference between sex and gender in the first place. To make it simple, sex is what is based on external genitalia as well as chromosomes, hormones, internal reproductive organs, and secondary sex characteristics. On the other hand, gender is the role and social identification of an individual as a male or female. Since gender is seen as a social construct, this leads to expectations within society for each gender. For example, females are seen as having to be nurturing, caring, and not assertive in any way for the fear of being seen as bossy while men are expected to be tough, gritty, and unemotional by society.

From these expectations sprout stereotypes such as women expecting to be the caregivers of children while men are expected to be the “bread winners” of the household, and if any of the stereotypes are broken they may cause distress for the individuals involved. A personal example that I can think of is when I was a teenager and worked in a pool store. The owner was a woman, and her husband had been working under her for many years at this point. One day when I was running the store, a customer walked in at the same time as the husband and sparked a conversation about what jobs they had. Upon hearing that the husband works for his wife, the customer seemed a little surprised and responded “why would you want to work for your wife?” in a rather passive aggressive manner, causing the situation to become awkward and uncomfortable. This example highlights the idea that men are supposed to be the bosses of the household while women are expected to be submissive and in a supportive role. Also, in other parts of the world such as the middle east, gender roles may restrict specific genders (mostly women) from things such as politics and power.

Traditionally in the United States, gender has been seen as strictly binary: two options (male and female). However, not everyone fits into this category in regards to either medical issues or a difference in gender identity. Third gender can be defined as individuals who are categorized, as either by themselves or society, as neither man nor woman. Those who do not fit into the binary system may fall victim to violence and judgment from the general population due to a misunderstanding about third gender or, in some cases, denial that individuals may be attracted to those that are of the third gender. However, not all nations have a society that seems so concerned with the third gender.

In the specific case of Kathoeys, or “Ladyboys”, of Thailand, there does not seem to be such a fear of those concerning themselves with the third gender. In fact, it appears that they’ve been relatively accepted into society. With its extremely large population within Thailand (~300,000 individuals) combined with the ever-important concept of reincarnation has lead to a society that accepts their presence in society. Many of them have varying beliefs on what they consider themselves. Regardless of whether they have had surgery or not, each individual has their own identity, with a combination of personal beliefs as well as the presence of religion that has helped them form their own identity over time.

All in all the exposure to the idea that there is such a thing as a third gender has had a rather large impact on me as a person. Until now, I had never really given the idea of a third gender any thought nor had I given any thought to how gender stereotypes may affect those stereotyped against. Beforehand, I was under the impression that those who identified as third gender either had a mental illness or some sort or simply desired attention. However, with realizing that other cultures in India, Thailand, and even here in the U.S. with Native Americans have recognized these individuals, combined with the concept that individuals can be born with ambiguous genitalia, I have come to the belief that individuals may be whatever they feel that they are because it appears that their decision does not affect my life in the slightest.

References/HR: slides